7 Psychopaths.

I’ve been on a big Sean Phillips kick lately, and the first comic I’m gonna bring up while I’m on it is 7 Psychopaths.

Essentially a WW2 Dirty Dozen type story, with the titular psychopaths on a suicide mission into Germany to assassinate Hitler. It follows the traditional three part flow for that sort of story: recruitment, training/downtime, and then the mission. But it doesn’t feel formulaic, despite adhering to the formula, and the English translation (7 Psychopaths was originally published in France) never finds it’s way into awkward phrasing the way translations like Battle Royale and Blacksad have.

Phillips is one of those artists who pencils are deceptively simple, and the combination of Dick Tracy comic strip and film noir that he excels at not only makes him perfectly suited to his best known* works (Criminal, Sleeper, Incognito), but for this pulp war story. As I mentioned, this was originally published in France, where as I understand it it was in an oversized format. I’d really like to find the French version just so I can see the artwork that much bigger, as it really is as cool to look at as it is to read.

*- I suppose technically his best known work to most was Marvel Zombies, but to be honest the longer that comic went on the more disappointing the series became. And that’s before it even got to the non-Kirkman/Phillips sequels. Still, for those that only know Phillips from that, here’s an OG piece of artwork from the second series: